Headphones need a lot of burn in time, just opened a box of Focal Utopias and they're getting disgraced by pretty much everything I put them against so far. I have no doubt though that the tables will turn once I put 200+ hours on them.
I'd rather wait for burn in and then post it on the Utopia thread, but initial impression is they're thin sounding due to missing mid bass/bass frequency information. Not as light on bass as some high end headphones I've tried but I wouldn't recommend them for dance/EDM because the bass crackles/breaks up. Classical music at low/moderate volume is best for the Utopia. The bass can fill out with burn in but the driver farting can't be fixed with burn in. I have a video with the driver crackling on a 70's song (Light Up The Night" by the Brothers Johnson)that has nowhere near the heavy kick and bass of today's tunes.
Reverb tails/ambience feels cut off but that can also be fixed with burn in. Once that kicks in it'll get a more "magical" feel. Out the box the treble clarity is extremely good but I feel a bit below the LCD-4. LCD-4 also has a more euphoric feel. Mid impact and dynamics are nothing special and at times feels soft.
Tomorrow I'm going to record the Utopia through a dummy head mic I built and compare it to the original .wav file, something I've done with over 40 other headphones. If you want I'll send it to you so you can hear the missing frequencies when compared to the original file.
I'd rather wait for burn in and then post it on the Utopia thread, but initial impression is they're thin sounding due to missing mid bass/bass frequency information. Not as light on bass as some high end headphones I've tried but I wouldn't recommend them for dance/EDM because the bass crackles/breaks up. Classical music at low/moderate volume is best for the Utopia. The bass can fill out with burn in but the driver farting can't be fixed with burn in. I have a video with the driver crackling on a 70's song (Light Up The Night" by the Brothers Johnson)that has nowhere near the heavy kick and bass of today's tunes.
Reverb tails/ambience feels cut off but that can also be fixed with burn in. Once that kicks in it'll get a more "magical" feel. Out the box the treble clarity is extremely good but I feel a bit below the LCD-4. LCD-4 also has a more euphoric feel. Mid impact and dynamics are nothing special and at times feels soft.
Tomorrow I'm going to record the Utopia through a dummy head mic I built and compare it to the original .wav file, something I've done with over 40 other headphones. If you want I'll send it to you so you can hear the missing frequencies when compared to the original file.
Of course your perspective is your perspective, but bass farting, really? I didn't notice any crackle breakup either with the Utopia through the DAVE. I do note they have very low distortion and, personally, don't feel they lack bass compared to my LCD-2.2. Especially surprised that you feel the impact and dynamics are nothing special and soft. I just can't reconcile how you could think that, and it's the opposite of what most others feel, and not just in this site.
I'm just curious how your impression is so different from others. Send the file, it should be interesting. As reference I'm interested to know how the home made dummy head mic performs. Could you also send other data for other headphones? Not doubting you or your perspective. Just curious.
Just so you know, I've been interested in the Nighthawks for a while as well. I may have to grab a pair after reading that my friend Nik has such high praise for them.
Of course your perspective is your perspective, but bass farting, really? I didn't notice any crackle breakup either with the Utopia through the DAVE. I do note they have very low distortion and, personally, don't feel they lack bass compared to my LCD-2.2. Especially surprised that you feel the impact and dynamics are nothing special and soft. I just can't reconcile how you could think that, and it's the opposite of what most others feel, and not just in this site.
I'm just curious how your impression is so different from others. Send the file, it should be interesting. As reference I'm interested to know how the home made dummy head mic performs. Could you also send other data for other headphones? Not doubting you or your perspective. Just curious.
I've been interested in the Nighthawks for a while. I may have to grab a pair after reading that my friend Nik has such high praise for them.
I own the Nighthawk and listened to the Elear and Utopia at the Focal CanJam booth. To my ears the Elear was much better and I am assuming that both demo units had burn in time. You might not find the Utopia improving with time if your ears are anything like mine.
What? I know. Did you read my reply? I mentioned I'm interested in the Nighthawks at the end simply to demonstrate I'm not being blindly biased as an owner of the Utopia.
Just for the record, from the price of Elear you can buy two Nighthawks. For the price of the HEX you get 2-3 Nighthawks. I do not even mention Utopia.
After many sessions with Nighthawk I can say with confidence they have gotten the tuning right, it is just a comfortable engaging sound made for music. I can't wait to see what they can up with next.
Just for the record, from the price of Elear you can buy two Nighthawks. For the price of the HEX you get 2-3 Nighthawks. I do not even mention Utopia.
After many sessions with Nighthawk I can say with confidence they have gotten the tuning right, it is just a comfortable engaging sound made for music. I can't wait to see what they can up with next.
Well, Nightowl for one. I provided my thoughts on it a bit earlier. My only sticking point was that upper mids were a bit too pronounced for my taste. Given the low distortion, I'm sure I could just apply a bit of EQ and move on happily!
Cheets to SkylarGray providing us with more beautifully tuned gear
I'd rather wait for burn in and then post it on the Utopia thread, but initial impression is they're thin sounding due to missing mid bass/bass frequency information. Not as light on bass as some high end headphones I've tried but I wouldn't recommend them for dance/EDM because the bass crackles/breaks up. Classical music at low/moderate volume is best for the Utopia. The bass can fill out with burn in but the driver farting can't be fixed with burn in. I have a video with the driver crackling on a 70's song (Light Up The Night" by the Brothers Johnson)that has nowhere near the heavy kick and bass of today's tunes.
Reverb tails/ambience feels cut off but that can also be fixed with burn in. Once that kicks in it'll get a more "magical" feel. Out the box the treble clarity is extremely good but I feel a bit below the LCD-4. LCD-4 also has a more euphoric feel. Mid impact and dynamics are nothing special and at times feels soft.
Tomorrow I'm going to record the Utopia through a dummy head mic I built and compare it to the original .wav file, something I've done with over 40 other headphones. If you want I'll send it to you so you can hear the missing frequencies when compared to the original file.
inthere, I downloaded the tracks you PM'd me and gave them all a listen on the Chord DAVE through Audirvana+ and compared all the recorded headphone tracks to the original that you provided. All I can say is that the description of the Utopia you gave isn't far off from what I hear in the tracks recorded through your dummy head mic. No amount of burn in would fix what I'm hearing with these recorded headphone tracks.
I'll break it down based on the recorded headphone tracks you provided:
- The ETHER C recorded track sounded extremely thin, low mids, weak bass.
- The PM-1 recorded track has soft treble, good mids, good bass, but not much excitement in the upper mids (a bit muffled), but overall the most pleasant sounding of the recorded bunch.
- The Utopia recorded track had a weird sheen, treble emphasis, no slam, distant bass, hollow.
I listened to all of these recorded headphone tracks with the LCD-2.2 as to keep the presentation through a different headphone than the ones you used in the recorded tracks, and I was looking for relative differences between tracks. Admittedly the LCD-2.2 (pre-fazor) has some slight grain in the treble, but I'm well aware of it and can mentally filter it out, and I'm quite familiar with it's FR.
Then I listened to the original recording you provided through the real thing as I own both the ETHER C and Utopia (unfortunately I could not compare with the PM-1), at a dB level of 80-85 average. The differences between the recorded headphone track and the real thing playing the original track weren't subtle and to be honest not an accurate representation of what I hear listening to the original file through either the ETHER C or the Utopia. The Utopia gains all of the slam back, the treble no longer has a weird sheen and the balance of the headphones sounds fantastic, including the bass and mid bass. The ETHER C still has a slightly weak bass, a slightly recessed mid range, and lots of treble energy, but it sounds no where near as bad as through the dummy mic head recording to me.
I can't speak to the bass distortion you reported because frankly I don't hear it. Certainly you can't deny the benefit of the completely open back design of the Utopia and it's measured distortion performance (which is - mostly - better than the Nighthawks already impressive low distortion BTW). I will say that overall the track seemed a little low in it's output level compared to some Decca classical and other very well mastered tracks I own like the original 1985 CD release of Brothers In Arms. Not necessarily a bad thing as I'd prefer that to over driven levels, but the lower recording level may reveal the noise floor of some amps as the volume is raised to compensate.
My takeaway is that what I hear (and obviously many other users) is not what you are hearing, especially if you are relying on the recorded headphone track to evaluate, and most especially with the recorded Utopia track, which to be honest does not sound at all like listening to the actual headphones to me. Or perhaps there is something in your audio chain that may be off. I have no idea. I honestly wonder if the pair you have is broken if you are reporting breakup and 'bass farting'. If you still want to send the updated file for the Utopia on the same setup as the others I'll give that a listen also. Thanks for sharing how you test these headphones. It's been enlightening. I see no reason to comment on this further. Apologies for the de-rail in the Nighthawk thread.
Back to the Nighthawks.
Edit: I just want to be clear that I'm only reporting what I've heard with my gear and can't speak for your ears, your setup, or your preferences. I am mostly curious about the bass distortion/breakup/farting report though. I can't get mine to do that with EDM or any other bass heavy music (Interstellar soundtrack pipe organs, jazz bass, etc.) at all.
Since this is a Nighthawk thread I'll take this to PMs, the "weird sheen" I suspect is because the Utopia was played through the GS-X mk2, which is probably not an ideal pairing. All the others were through the Audeze Deckard, so I'll hook that up today when I get a chance. The "farting" I have on video and I'll send that.
Okie dokie, here's a scoop for you: AudioQuest requested I show up at their booth for a little private demo of a new sealed headphone. There's a lot to like about their NightHawk—extremely low distortion, for example—but it's sound signature was a little too laid back for my taste. Enter the upcoming NightOwl—a sealed version of the NightHawk. This time around the tuning has come more forward and sounded very tasty to me. I had to beg and plead to get permission to post this pic...folks need to know this can is coming down the pike. Can't wait to get my hands on a production unit. Wheeeeee!
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